Thursday, August 28, 2014

I find myself picking up Malay books and discarding them by page 45. I have lost my tolerance for slower pacing, preachy drama and annoying plot devices.

But I found none of those peeves in this anthology; a marvelous cornucopia of romance (of the weird kind), urban fantasy, sprinkled with a good dose of homicidal mania and sheer hilarity.Suspend your disbelief and just enjoy the ride.

I don't read very many Americana historical romance. Primarily it's because the more I learn about the victimisation of the indigenous people of North America, the harder it is for me to read about the romantic half breed yearning for the blonde homestead daughter. So that takes the cowboy genre out of circulation for me and except for Pamela Morsi and Rebecca Paisley, I rarely come across other settings for Americana historical.

I liked the premise of New Orleans prior to the War Between the States and Ms. Blake did an excellent job of painting the atmosphere and society of the Deep South. I also liked that she didn't whitewash slavery in the premise and did it without contemporary moralising.

However, the female protagonist annoyed me with the way she vaccilated between being so die-away and bull-headed assertion of her independence. A bit like a spoilt brat, but I gave that a pass judging by her age and background. The male protagonist was a total dyed-in-the-wool hero; brave, self-sacrificing, painfully honourable etc etc, but a bit cookie cutter. I think that both characters could have done with greater character development, but alas, that territory was not ventured.